Conventionally, web portals, which provide access to a variety of applications and content through a single location, have become an increasingly popular means for delivering applications and information. Whereas previously, web portals were used to deliver a relatively limited amount of functionality, they have become an increasingly popular means for delivering functional applications to local and global communities.
While many custom applications have been developed for use with web portals, an ongoing concern has been the need to develop an applications infrastructure for supporting more complex applications. Various mechanisms have been proposed to address this issue. The Web Services for Remote Portlets (WSRP) standard from the Oasis Group establishes a framework whereby applications can be presented on a page without the need for a support apparatus for the application on the server delivering the page.
However, conventional implementations of WSRP are limited in their ability to perform authentication or otherwise control access to portlets. For example, current approaches allow a system to access a portlet, but are quite limited in their capabilities to provide access to multiple portlets provided by various producers.
What is needed are improved techniques for organizing remote portlets.